Giving USA, a public service initiative of the Giving Institute and one of the definitive sources of information on U.S. philanthropy, reveals some interesting data relevant to animal welfare funding in its recently released 2015 edition, which covers 2014 giving by both individuals and institutions. There’s both good news and bad news

First, the bad news: of all the programmatic areas receiving charitable dollars in 2014, Environment/Animals (these categories were combined in the report) got the smallest share – only 3% of total giving – indicating that there is still much work to be done in convincing the giving public and philanthropic institutions to make this area a higher priority than it is currently. Furthermore, considering that the Environment and Animals categories were combined in the report, the percentage of giving earmarked specifically for animal protection is even less than that low 3%.

But the good news is that in 2014, total charitable giving to nonprofits working in this programmatic area reached an all-time high of $10.5 billion in inflation-adjusted dollars, increasing by 7% over the previous year – the fifth consecutive annual increase – which indicates a clear pattern of growing appreciation for the importance of this work.

The Giving USA graphic below shows giving for Environment/Animals as a portion of total 2014 giving.